"Mr.
Speaker: We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our
own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have
no right to so appropriate a dollar of the public money. We cannot, without
the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt.
We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as a charity.
Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much money of our
own as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for
this bill, but I will give one week's pay to the object, and if every
member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill
asks."-Congressman
Davy Crockett

Not
one other member of the U. S. House agreed to match Davy Crockett's offer
of one week's pay as charity for the widow of a deceased army officer,
the subject of the Bill. They would rather give away our money. Nothing
has changed.

Many
years ago, when I was in the Army, the "hat" was passed for
the local charity. Everyone was "encouraged" to give so that
the detachment would get a 100% award and the Captain was fairly adamant
about obtaining that goal. Now I was in the Army as a draftee and I had
to be there. I had no choice. But something comes over me when someone
tells me I "must" do something, especially when it concerns
what I consider to be a voluntary act. My "back" went up and
I said no, rather emphatically. Because I did not give to the local charity
and I was the only one that did not give, the detachment did not receive
the 100% award.

Needless
to say, the Captain was none too pleased with me and called me on the
carpet. I believe his words were, "we have places to
send people like you" and he alluded to Vietnam. It
was 1961 and Vietnam was just heating up. I wasn’t really too keen
on going there.

He went
on to say that I had better have a damn good reason for not giving, or
I was "going to pay", one way or another. As I was standing
before the Captain at attention, my mind raced for a good “reason.”
I finally blurted out that, "….. on the list of
groups that were receiving the charity, I noticed three subversive groups
and I couldn’t in good conscience give my money to those groups."
My answer satisfied the Captain begrudgingly, but he always had his "eye"
on me. It’s a wonder I didn’t end up in Vietnam. Fortunately,
I had a bird colonel on my side.

All
of my life I have been battered by people telling me what to do, when
I fully did not want to do whatever it was they wanted me to do. When
I worked at Boeings in Seattle, it was the same thing. They had to get
100% in the local charity drive for each company division. Division heads
were dressed down if they didn't get that 100%. But Boeing was really
good at convincing us to just have our donation deducted from our salary.
That way you won’t miss it. Propaganda! I resisted there too, but
paid a price for my resistance.

The
reason for my resistance should be obvious. I still consider myself a
free spirit, equipped with unalienable rights, as a gift from my creator.
One of those rights is the right of free choice. Voluntary charity fits
neatly in the right of free choice. To "give" is and should
be "MY" choice, not the governments, not the army and certainly
not the company for which I am employed. I haven’t been employed
by any company for over well 30 years now, as I don’t follow instructions
well. In one review of my work, I was told I had an over zealous personal
initiative disorder. To this day, I’m not sure what the reviewer
meant by this, but I have an idea what he meant …... I don’t
"play" well with the other children. Being the maverick that
I am, it is probably just as well that I am otherwise self-employed.

Which
brings us to the touchy subject of government enforced charity. It seems,
according to the government’s definition of charity, I have an absolute
obligation to "help" my fellow man and the government is the
final arbiter as to the depth of that obligation and who is deserving
of my enforced charity. With the force of law and the threat of being
grilled, fined, penalized and jailed by the Internal Revenue Service if
I don’t comply, it could be construed that my obligation can be
any amount that government decides is my "fair share" of that
charity. This is not charity ladies and gentlemen, this is servitude!
This is enslavement! This is being wrapped in invisible chains! This is
removing liberty and the right of free choice! If we do not resist this
unconstitutional injustice with all of our might, if we do not tell others
to resist, we deserve to be slaves.

At the
risk of offending a large segment of the American people, let me be succinct:
"I owe nothing to anyone that I don't freely choose to
give."

The
essence of true freedom is free choice. Without free choice we are but
slaves to whomever wish to dominate us and unfortunately the world is
full of those who would dominate us, as individuals and as a nation. If
we are not free to choose, then we are not free. It is no more complicated
than that.

I choose
to be compassionate of my own free will because being compassionate has
value to me and to my life, not because I may go to Hell if I do not show
compassion. And my compassion is strictly limited to those who truly cannot
help themselves, family and friends. My compassion is not extended to
those who have two working arms, two working legs, a reasonably functioning
brain and in good health. Let the lessons of life's adversities bring
them to self-reliance, independence and individual responsibility. If
we do otherwise, then we breed a nation of weaklings who would rather
be servants to their handlers (slaves) than stand tall and proud as free
men.

Oh yes,
I know I will hear from some religious people saying that "...
we are our brother's keeper", as they fall back on
what they were taught in Sunday school. That irrational compassion
for the functioning weak and free loaders among us and to those who illegally
invade our sovereignty as a national mindset, are what have brought us
to the brink of national bankruptcy and threaten our very existence as
a free and prosperous nation.

Ladies
and gentlemen, I was not created to serve my fellow man, nor were you.
I serve the essence of my life because I WAS created,
as do all living things. I was pre-programmed to preserve that life at
whatever cost, as survival is an absolute requirement for the preservation
of life. If there are those (individuals, groups, or governments)
that choose to take my possessions without my permission, or take my life,
I am pre-programmed to vigorously defend my possessions and my life by
whatever means as an act of self-preservation, if I strongly believe that
my possessions and my life have value to me. If I see little value in
my possessions or my life, or I am unwilling to defend them, then I am
easy prey for those who are determined to dominate me.

I had
no choice in my creation. I had no choice in my early environment, even
though I am a product of that creation and that environment. I only owe
my parents respect, if they are worthy of respect. I only owe respect
to authority if that authority is not corrupt. I only owe respect to others
if they too are worthy of respect and they are self-reliant, independent,
individually responsible and honorable within the limits of their capabilities.
However, as an act of free choice, I have compassion for those, who through
no fault of their own, cannot be self-reliant, independent and individually
responsible. I have a special niche of compassion for those brave men
and women in uniform that serve, or have served our country, on or off
the battlefield.

I owe
my children the solemn duty to prepare them for adulthood by instilling
in them and teaching them pragmatic moral values and the value of self-reliance,
independence and individual responsibility, as absolute requirements for
survival and freedom. If I am incapable of doing that, I have failed in
that solemn duty and I have failed in my duty to my country, for I will
have created an extra burden on society for which society will have to
pay.

If I
start a business, I owe nothing to anyone. Those who speak of "corporate
responsibility" are those who wish to dominate us by
guilt. If however, I create a product or a service that offers value and
meets expectations and I do no harm, I will prosper and my customers will
be happy. If I do the opposite, the free market will remove me from business
and I will have failed in business. That is the essence of a free market.

To many
of our readers this must seem harsh, self-indulgent and almost arrogant
if you will. But this is the harsh reality of all life, if life and liberty
are to be preserved. My only duty to others is to treat them as I wish
to be treated. That duty is manifested in my efforts to act with honor
and do no harm to others.

Government's
role is to protect all of us within our nation's borders from harm from
enemies, foreign and domestic and to protect all of us from the harm that
individuals or groups may inflict on others, within reason. Government's
other duty is to stay within the limits of its power and protect the rights
of the individual as the absolute mandate contained in our Constitution.
That is the essence of a fair and just government. Government's role is
not to exceed the limits of its power, or buy votes or crony favors with
our money, or over-regulate and over-tax our possessions, our property
and our life, for that is the essence of an arrogant and fascist government,
bent on total domination.

The
substance of what we have delineated here was plainly laid out at the
end of the speech given by John Galt in Ayn Rand's fictitious novel entitled,
"Atlas Shrugged", from which we now quote:

"In
the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of
man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who
have never achieved. Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate
is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited
roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the
hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all.
Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the
life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road
and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists,
it is real, it is possible, it's yours.

"But
to win it requires your total dedication and a total break with the world
of your past, with the doctrine that man is a sacrificial animal who exists
for the pleasure of others. Fight for the value of your person. Fight
for the virtue of your pride. Fight for the essence of that which is man:
for his sovereign rational mind. Fight with the radiant certainty and
the absolute rectitude of knowing that yours is the Morality of Life and
that yours is the battle for any achievement, any value, any grandeur,
any goodness, any joy that has ever existed on this earth.

What
John Galt said is the very essence of individual liberty, the irrevocable
gift from our creator. It is the substance of what millions of men and
women have died for in the defense of freedom. No matter what you may
think about his words, they are not a repudiation of compassion, as compassion
is an act of volition ..... an act of free choice. Compassion is not and
never should be, a mandate from government because a government mandate
is the antithesis of free choice. The American people are the most generous
people on Earth, if government doesn't suck them dry to buy votes or favors.

It is
clear. The window for free Americans to save individual liberty is rapidly
closing. The time and the place to act are right now. There may never
be another chance, our situation being that dire. Without a clear understanding
of what individual freedom means, there can be no strong commitment to
reclaim it, much less preserve it.

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Many
years ago, around the time the Declaration of Independence was written,
a famous man said: "The Price of Liberty is Eternal Vigilance."
This is not only appropriate to the defense against the enemies we can
see, but it is doubly appropriate to the defense of the enemy we can't
see, that dreaded enemy of all ..... apathy! Time is running out as the
door to freedom is almost closed. And when the giant door of liberty clangs
shut in your forlorn faces and the last faint ring fades quietly into
the night, may each of you remember in anguish, the opportunity you had
to keep that door open and may your inaction burn forever in your memories,
like a red hot branding iron on your bare skin. If this day comes to pass,
and it may, you will have forsaken your duty to your children and grandchildren
and your individual duty to be honorable, self-reliant, independent and
individually responsible, the very essence of freedom and free choice.
You owe nothing to anyone except ..... self-reliance, independence, individual
responsibility and your sacred honor.

Ron Ewart, a
nationally known author and speaker on freedom and property issues and
author of his weekly column, "In Defense of Rural America",
is the President of the National Association of Rural Landowners, (NARLO)
a non-profit corporation headquartered in Washington State and dedicated
to restoring, maintaining and defending property rights for urban and
rural landowners. Mr. Ewart can be reached by e-mail for comment at ron@narlo.org,
or by 'phone at 1 800 682-7848.

I had no choice in
my creation. I had no choice in my early environment, even though I am
a product of that creation and that environment. I only owe my parents
respect, if they are worthy of respect. I only owe respect to authority
if that authority is not corrupt.